1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to fishing and, more particularly, to a lure for use in fishing.
2. Description of the Related Art
Studies have indicated that fish are attracted to food from its movement and/or vibrations produced therefrom in the water, as well as its odor or scent. Heretofore, artificial lures have been principally designed to duplicate movement, color, or otherwise give the impression of natural bait, and such lures are currently sold in a myriad of designs to attract each type and variety of game fish. More recently, existing compounds have been found or have been made synthetically or biochemically reproduced or obtained by natural extraction, to duplicate the scent of natural bait. These scientifically formulated attractants are claimed to have proven effectiveness to stimulate a fish's predatory instincts, so that an otherwise inactive fish will begin to hunt for food and be attracted to the lure from which these scents emanate. A taste component which compliments the attractant stimulants, is utilized to mask any offensive odors from the fisherman handling the bait during the baiting process. Currently, in order to create a "smell path", these attractants are topically applied to the fisherman's favorite lure before use. However, it has been found that the attractant's characteristics soon washes off the impervious metallic or plastic surface of the lure, and the attractant's characteristics are soon lost. Oil based attractants soon flush to the surface, losing their effectiveness. Water soluble or miscible attractants are equally short lived, as these coatings are soon dissolved into the aqueous environment. Therefore, these attractants must be applied every 7-15 casts, which is both tedious and expensive.
The prior art has sought to overcome these disadvantages with a compromised fish attractant system by offering a material consisting of an attractant impregnated into a cellulose sponge or a cloth reinforced urethane sponge combination, which are shaped into thin strips or triangles, and these pieces are added onto a plain hook or hooks of conventional lures. The disadvantage of this prior art is that these impregnated sponge pieces have limited effectiveness, because their shapes do not resemble a natural bait. Also, if used as an appendage on a preexisting lure, the sponge piece will alter the movement of the lure through the water since the lure was designed to move through the water without these appendages. These triangular sponge strips have no physical resemblance to a lure, produce no special movement on their own, and therefore when used in conjunction with a mechanical lure, function only as a reservoir for the scent attractant.
Even though the prior art mentions use of sponge as a component of a lure, there is no prior art indicating the substitution of a castable sponge material for the entire lure in the original design of the lure, e.g. molding the lure from sponge rather from another material, such as substituting sponge for the soft polyvinyl chloride plastisol worms or other rubbery substances of which many lures are now composed. Even though the prior art anticipated the benefit of a sponge as an absorbent for the fish attractant, it did not anticipate the sponge as the entire lure, encompassing design details such as ridges, tapered appendages etc., like the lure bait. The prior art did not anticipate this invention because there was no conception of a sponge with the strength, pore volume and formability, including castability, of the hydroxylated polyvinyl acetal (HPVA) material used in the present invention.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,940,869 to Roberts teaches a lure cut from a compressible sponge which, upon wetting, expands, but only teaches cutting, not casting into shapes, nor molding, and only teaches cellulose sponge, not HPVA sponge or any other sponge which may be also compressible. The expandability of the sponge hides the hook, although a pre-expanded sponge can do the same. Expandability to hide hooks is also taught in a later patent, U.S. Pat. No. 4,744,167 to Steele. Cutting and not casting limits shapes possible as the spherical or contoured aspects of natural food cannot be duplicated. In addition, cellulose is also a non-stretchable material, tears and fragments easily, is attacked by mold, has non-controllable pore size and, cannot be molded as commercially available, and has poor abrasion resistance, and therefore will soon lose integrity. Casting a foam lure is not suggested by these patents because commercial cellulose sponge is not castable. In addition, the lures die cut from sheet cellulose sponge are inferior in physical characteristics to HPVA sponge as will be discussed below.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,797,519 to Keller teaches an artificial lure including a bendable metal base and any porous material, sponge, rubber or any resilient plastic. The bendable component shapes the lure, and is motion influencing. The porous material or plastic is capable of being impregnated with a fish scent and textured. This patent is non-specific to the type of material.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,856,223 to Evans teaches a method of manufacturing a lure made by the combining of plastics with a foamed plastic, porous textile or natural material. The textured surface of the foam provides an improved means for detecting a fish biting. Industrial foams mentioned are filter foams, e.g. polyester polyurethanes. No mention is made of HPVA sponge.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,410,689 to Nathan teaches a mass of foamed plastic having fish attractant combined therein during the formation of the foam. The fish attractant disjoins the foamed mass when submerged in water.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,736,542 teaches a rigid absorbent body constructed of fibrous absorbent material, e.g. felt, into which is impregnated fish oil attractant.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,953,934 to Visser teaches a similar device except the body of the lure is made of a sintered metal. The disadvantage of sintered metal is that vacuum pressure is required to reasonably impregnate the fine pores of the metal foam.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,744,167 teaches a lure including a sponge that prevents hook points from snagging underwater objects; however, the deformability of the sponge allows the fish to be caught on the hooks when the fish's bite deforms the sponge. The sponge is used as an improvement, e.g. part of a spinner arrangement, and not as a lure per se.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,958,357 to Frank teaches a prepackaged fish bait consisting of a porous tubular container filled with the bait which, when threaded on the hook, prevents the bait from prematurely coming off, premeasures the amount of bait, allows slower release of fish attractant component from the bait, camouflages the hook, and minimizes handling by the fisherman.
In the above mentioned prior art describing lures or lure components of cellulose, urethane, polyester urethanes, fibrous materials and cloth, the use of HPVA sponge in accordance with the invention improves the properties of all these lures because of the overall superior physical properties of the HPVA sponge material.
For example, urethane and polyester urethane foams have less tear strength, less hydrophilicity, less chemical stability to light, less chemical stability towards hydrolysis, more notch sensitivity to propagating a tear around hook protrusions, are less easily dyed or pigmented, are less easy to impregnate and do not hold onto the impregnate with fish attractant because of smoother internal pore geometry than HPVA sponge.
Cellulose sponges have poor tear resistance, shred, support mildew and bacterial attacks, have poor chemical and color stability, elongation, flexibility and abrasion resistance, cannot be molded, and cannot make thinner cross sections. Felts, cloths and sintered metals have low impregnation capacity, poor bait-like texture, and are difficult to fabricate.